Forgotten
by Takira
Summary: Introspective Trowa, at Quatre's bedside just after the series' end; I'm mostly just trying to work my way into his head, and it helps to write it out...


* * *

I've been thinking. I do that, sometimes, and recently I've had more time in which I have nothing specific to do, and it creates a tendency in me to think--I'm not entirely sure why, but it doesn't bother me. It doesn't hurt.

I've been thinking about substance. I've listened to a lot of people, and beneath whatever motives they're proclaiming at the moment, they all seem to need at least the feeling of substance; if they don't have it, they will believe that their life is a waste and, somehow, that translates immediately into necessary death.

I don't think death is necessary.

Now, they do tell me I decided to die a while ago, while I was at the circus; I'm not sure why I did that--I think it may have had something to do with Heero--but I haven't stopped to sit down and think about it, so none of it is particularly clear. Sometimes I get bits and pieces of it without trying, in flashbacks or dreams, and I can compare them to what I've been told; I don't remember Catherine crying, but I seem to recall her slapping me.

It was very odd to me, because at some level I think I expected her to do more than that. My body felt no shock at the blow, only a sort of dull anticipation that made me wonder why she didn't hit me again. It wasn't as though she could do much; she's a delicate thing, and I must be difficult to damage. I assume this because I've never been laid up like Heero was, or like Quatre was after Libra was destroyed--after the war ended, they say.

It...doesn't feel like the war is over, to me, but perhaps I'm too numb to sense the difference. I've watched the television from time to time, and I see and hear people who don't act like the war is over--moreover, they don't act like they want it to be over. Most of them were or are still connected with the military, and that's what got me to thinking about substance and its necessity. I think they found their concept of substance in the war, and now that the war is supposed to be over, they're afraid that they must die, and they don't want to. I don't find anything odd in that. Not everyone wants to die, and one might guess that those who really want to die don't last very long, if they know what they're doing and have no one looking out for them.

It's interesting how that works. I would be dead now, if not for Catherine, and Quatre might be dead now if not for me, but he didn't want to die...not really. If he'd wanted to, I suppose I could have left him behind in Libra once my mission was completed; I don't know if Dorothy would have helped him escape or not, and he wasn't going to leave her unless I insisted. I had no instructions about Quatre, so it was my choice. I am good at making choices, in spite of appearances--memory isn't at all necessary to making choices. If it were, I wonder if we wouldn't have peacetime after all.

No, it wasn't strange that I decided to help Quatre...what was strange was the reason I did. I walked into the mobile dolls' control room and saw him there with Dorothy, and he was injured. I know he's seen fit to care for me: he loves everyone. I know how much it hurt him to have nearly killed me. I know he would have leapt to save me, had I been in his position and he in mine. Knowing all that I did, and knowing that I did not wish him dead, and seeing him kneeling on the floor, clutching his wound and panting like a frightened animal, I thought I would have hated Dorothy. I thought I would have felt some surge of warmth toward him, some need to care for him.

I felt nothing...and that, rather than his condition, is what made my heart--what there is of it--feel cold. Pain.

I wasn't sure what to make of it, so I completed my mission first and talked to Dorothy. It helps me, sometimes, to talk things out; usually there's no one there to hear me. Then again, usually I don't find myself needing to think when I am alone.

_"How sad...a woman that can't cry."_ I could say that to her; I'd shed tears of my own before. Duo still hasn't forgiven me for that whole incident, and even if he knew I'd cried when I did it, I doubt it would make a difference. I still felt nothing, except maybe a slight wonder at the sparkling--and in any case, Duo has larger things and people to forgive before he can get to me. Quatre would be sad if he knew...he's very adamant about forgiveness. He wouldn't rest at the hospital until I'd told him I forgave him for firing on me. He'd already forgiven Dorothy by the time I'd finished my mission and had to make my choice.

I was still a little confused, both at the pain in my chest and at the fact that I wavered, and it was not until I was placing Quatre in his Sandrock--he was trying to check in with the other pilots even as I strapped him in--that I realized the essence of what I had done.

I'd felt an emotion...and I'd acted on it. By Heero's estimation I was, for the first time in my thin-worn memory, living a good life.

Does that give me reason to live? Does it give me substance? It's hardly so large a thing as war, and while one would assume that Heero acted by his own credo, he still saw no reason not to self-destruct when ordered. That on its own would imply that a good life on its own does not justify its own existance...but Dr. J does not represent Heero's emotions, and thus, Heero might have been acting purely on orders. Perhaps, if I see him again, I can ask him.

I think I would enjoy that. I can't recall anyone else who's managed to surprise me into laughing--I'd like to do it again.

"...Trowa?"

I open my eyes at the whisper, Quatre's worried face close to mine, his hand hovering just above my shoulder as though loathe to startle me. I should tell him sometime that he doesn't have to do that; I've never cared overmuch about being touched, and unlike the other pilots I don't automatically strike at unexpected contact.

"Are you all right, Trowa? I didn't mean to wake you."

"I wasn't asleep," I murmur, looking at him. He is one of the very few people I've met that can hold eye contact with me, or perhaps he's merely the only one that wants to. It doesn't matter. I'm getting used to it.

"The nurse brought some hot water, and I made tea. Would you like some? If you need to rest, I can ask them to bring in another cot..."

"Tea is fine." I don't particularly care one way or another about tea, but that describes my feelings toward most things, and it makes Quatre feel better to have done something small for me while I'm here. He's talking about other things now, and I leave off my train of thought with no conclusions reached. It's all right; I have a lot to think about. It feels as though I've been on the verge of revelation all my life--and each time I can almost reach out and grasp what's eluded me for so many years...I forget it all again.

So close, and yet...

* * *


End file.
